The Theater of Transformation

Postmodernism in American Drama
Erscheinungsjahr 2005
ISBN: 978-90-420-1895-2
Verlag: Brill | Rodopi

Buch, Englisch, Band 37, 230 Seiten, Format (B × H): 155 mm x 235 mm, Gewicht: 373 g

Reihe: Postmodern Studies

The Theater of Transformation: Postmodernism in American Drama offers a fresh and innovative reading of the contemporary experimental American theater scene and navigates through the contested and contentious relationship between postmodernism and contemporary drama. This book addresses gender and class as well as racial issues in the context of a theoretical discussion of dramatic texts, textuality, and performance. Transformation is contemporary drama's answer to the questions of postmodernism and a major technique in the development of a postmodern language for the stage. In order to demonstrate the multi-faceted nature of the postmodern theater of transformation, this study draws on a wide range of plays: from early experimental plays of the 1960s by Jean-Claude van Itallie through feminist plays by Megan Terry and Rochelle Owens to more recent drama by the African-American playwright Suzan-Lori Parks.
The Theater of Transformation: Postmodernism in American Drama is written for anyone interested in contemporary American drama and theater as well as in postmodernism and contemporary literary theory. It appeals even more broadly to a readership intrigued by the ubiquitous aspects of popular culture, by feminism and ethnicity, and by issues pertaining to the so-called 'society of spectacle' and the study of contemporary media.

Fachgebiete

• Interdisziplinäres Wissenschaften Wissenschaft und Gesellschaft | Kulturwissenschaften Kulturwissenschaften
• Geisteswissenschaften Literaturwissenschaft Englische Literatur Amerikanische Literatur
• Geisteswissenschaften Theater- und Filmwissenschaft | Andere Darstellende Künste Theaterwissenschaft Theatergeschichte
• Geisteswissenschaften Theater- und Filmwissenschaft | Andere Darstellende Künste Theaterwissenschaft Theatertheorie, Ästhetik des Theaters, Theaterkritik

Inhaltsverzeichnis

I Introduction: The Postmodern Condition of Drama
II Theorizing Dramatic Form: Aspects of Transformation in Postmodern Drama
III Jean-Claude van Itallie: Mediatized Culture and the Postmodern Self
IV Megan Terry and Rochelle Owens: Transformation and Postmodern Feminism
V Suzan-Lori Parks: “Rep & Rev” Postmodernism
VI Works Cited

Über Autor(innen)

Kerstin Schmidt is currently Assistant Professor of American Studies and Intercultural Anglophone Studies in the Department of English at the University of Bayreuth, Germany.